


Cut to the Bone

by wickedrum



Category: Halt and Catch Fire
Genre: F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-04
Updated: 2017-05-15
Packaged: 2018-10-28 04:02:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10823352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wickedrum/pseuds/wickedrum
Summary: Coda to Season 3, with some changes here and there, or how I would've preferred it to go down.





	1. Fool Yourself

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Mia_J](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mia_J/gifts).



> It's hard to believe what a whump opportunity has been passed there with Joe falling though the floor!
> 
> Genre: G, romance, sickfic.  
> Rating/Warning: some adultish themes, nothing major.  
> Disclaimers: I don't own anything, barely my knickers.
> 
> Additional Notes: 
> 
> 1\. Title is in reference to The King of Wishful Thinking by Go West, featured on the Soundtrack of Season 3. All chapter titles from that Soundtrack.  
> 2\. Story is written on request by Mia Jezkova. My apologies for it not being up to the same standard as my previous fics, I'm kind of out of touch with the fandom. I didn't forget the request, it just took me a while to finish what I was writing before.  
> Set: Starting at middle of the confrontation between Tom and Joe in 3.10. Let me jog your memory:  
> 'Joe: Let's cut the bullshit, Tom. Your problem isn't the idea.  
> Tom: You're right, Joe. Do you know what my problem is? I don't want to see Cameron end up like Ryan.  
> Cameron: Tom!'  
> And this is where we cut in, AU from here!

Chapter 1: Fool Yourself

“You say his name one more time--” Joe shifted to be closer, face to face and into a more confrontational stance opposite his perceived rival to Cameron's heart. 

“Ryan. Do you remember him?” Tom challenged him immediately, but didn't leave him time to react given that there was another, more burning matter on his mind. “What happened at COMDEX?” He advanced as well, with barely any breathing space between the adversaries now.

“What!” Cameron flew to action to round the table and grab one of her husband's arms he had placed at his hips, anger mode fully activated. “Tom, nothing happened!” She didn't get him to budge to even look at him though, so she repeated, “nothing happened!”

“It's not you I want to hear it from!” The programmer held his ground. 

Joe smirked at him and stalked back a little with a smug face. It wasn't an admission, but it wasn't looking like a denial either, just an invitation for further choler. “You were there,” Tom turned back towards the table to Donna, “did you see them together? What were they doing?”

“Don't drag me into this!” The redhead complained, “I wanted to mend my relationship with Cameron, not damage it further!”

“So there is something to hide? What did you see!” Tom insisted. 

“I asked Joe to talk to her and he did. That's all I know. We met at a party and Cameron was doing what people do at a party, drink and dance.”

“Dance with him?” The enraged husband demanded, pointing at Joe.

“No, no,” Donna let herself to be dragged into it after all in her eagerness not to incriminate her once friend and convince her into a collaboration, “I didn't see them dancing together, I saw Cameron dancing on her own.” That she had seen Mutiny's founder grab Joe and hold hands with him as they left she did not deem important to mention at this point. 

Not getting a satisfactory answer from any of them, Tom rounded on his adversary again, “what kind of reconnecting did you talk about! What happened at COMDEX!”

Joe huffed, “you know what your problem is? Your problem is that you don't trust your wife because you know fine well you can never really have Cameron and that you never ever even really had her.”

The truth hurt so Tom lunged at him, landing in a belly punch before the taller man reacted, Joe being too busy gauging Cameron's reaction to pay enough attention to the lawfully wedded husband. The former executive sagged forwards with the effect of the well aimed and lucky shot, but took his attacker down with him, taking the tussle to the ground where they were pulled apart by the others. 

“Joe! Joe! Joe!” There was a cacophony of voices and shrieks he tried to hold on to as he fell through the creaky wooden floor, pain blinded him the next moment. There were still voices above him, worried calls asking him of his well-being and he really wanted to turn, look up, assure them, but the painful sensation in his side was keeping him from doing so. But Gordo, his friend he saw, arriving at a run to his side downstairs and Joe momentarily wondered how the engineer was even capable of such feat with his own medical condition he had and all. 

“Oh god, there's blood,” Gordon panicked very unhelpfully.

“No worries, I've been impaled a lot worse before,” Joe looked at the sharp piece of metal protruding from the side of his abdomen.

“Donna! Call 911,” the older man instructed upwards, then returned his attention on his friend once he saw his ex-wife disappeared in the direction of the office and the phone residing there. 

“Joe, it will be alright, just hold still,” Cameron seemed to have arrived as well, grabbing for his hand. 

“What..what can we do?” Gordon kept his eyes averted from the injury site, visibly more disturbed than the sufferer himself. 

“I was bored in Japan, especially at first, so I took a first aid course,” Cameron blabbered, “do not move the foreign object, he might bleed to death if we take it out.”

“Come on guys, it's not that serious.” The whole situation in fact seemed hilarious to Joe, the two people most important in his life suddenly so concerned for his welfare when they wouldn't have been other times. The looks on their faces, it almost made him laugh bar for the fact that the metal wedge in his side didn't allow for such movement of the muscles without sending a searing jolt and the sensation of further ripping through to his brain. He held his breath, waiting for the moment to pass. 

“You're in shock,” Cameron provided rather unhelpfully herself, though it must've been based on her whatever meagre medical knowledge she had had as she peered in the injury's direction. “Gordon, your jacket, we need to keep him warm.”

“Does it hurt anywhere else, Joe?” The woman of his dreams fussed. In fact it didn't, not even his stomach, not that much. The nausea he felt clued him in that there must've been pain, but he didn't feel it. It was as if it would've been numbed instead, and the numbness was spreading, threatening to overtake his senses. Cameron was probably right, he was in shock and losing blood. It didn't matter though, his hand still felt Cameron's in his own. 

“The ambulance is on its way,” Donna's voice intruded from above, but that was the last thing he heard.

Tbc


	2. Ship's Not Sinking

Chapter 2: Ship's Not Sinking

Cameron jumped up from her seat at the sight of Gordon exiting the swing doors of the intensive care unit. “Did you find out anything?”

“Yes,” Gordon nodded vehemently, reassuringly. “He will be alright, out of surgery. He should wake soon.”

“Thanks,” Cameron bowed her head, worries still consuming her, urging her to close into herself. But she did think of giving an appreciative, fleeting hug to her friend before glancing at her husband at the back of the waiting room. “I'll go tell Tom, and I want to be there when Joe wakes up.”

“That's good because I was thinking I should get him some things from his apartment he might need,” the spectacled man offered. 

“Great, you do that,” the games programmer wandered over to her husband slowly, not really looking forward to the conversation. 

“So he's okay?” Tom stood at her approach.

“He will be.”

“Look, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have hit him...”

“No, you shouldn't have,” Cameron looked away, fuming.

“It's not as if I like what I've done. I admit that jealousy got away with me at certain points, but...”

“But you still want to know what happened at COMDEX,” his wife summarised. She shook her head and took a seat, hands in her pockets for comfort, and leaning forward so she could stare at the floor and avoid eye contact. Tom sat back down, opposite her, as keen on the answer as at the same time he wasn't. He needed to know. 

“Joe and I...” Cameron paused to find the right words amidst emotional turmoil, “we are like poles of a magnet, always pushing and pulling. You don't understand, it's like a natural, physics law that any times we meet, one of those two will happen. It's not like it is with you, safe and planned.”

“Oh, I understand. Let me guess, it was pulling this time.”

“I didn't mean it to happen is what I'm trying to say!”

Tom scoffed. “Let me ask you something. When I tell you I love you, many times a day, and you respond alike, you don't really mean it, do you,” he jeered. “It's just an automatic response, what you think I want to hear, no emotion, you never initiate it. Don't even answer that. I'm the thickheaded lovefool who thought you could ever be over him!”

“I did not mean to hurt you, I wanted us to work out,” Cameron tried to convince the both of them, “I wanted a life with you.”

“So you don't want it anymore?” Tom accused pointedly.

“I don't know what I want.”

“I love you..” The husband made a last, desperate plea.

“Maybe...maybe I'm just not capable of love, you know? Then you're looking in the wrong direction.”

Tom heaved a big sigh, nodding to his thoughts, “I can't be near you right now. You have your return ticket to Japan. I will be at the gate waiting for you when the time comes. You need to figure this out, what you want, stop torturing us both, either way,” he grabbed his jacket from the seat beside him and made for the exit. 

Cameron stood as well, with his name on her lips, opened her mouth, but thought better of it. There was nothing more she could say to ease the tension, make things right. Relationships were messed up, they never worked out, which is why she was much happier with her numbers. She wanted what everyone wanted, to be loved and not to be alone. But her simply being there wasn't enough for Tom and she was quite sure she could not be what he wanted. However, that plane was not leaving for another week so it was a problem for another day. Today, she wanted to know, to see for herself that Joe was okay. The ward she stepped into was scary. Too many machines, motionless patients and the sense of unnaturalness weighing on the spirit, but thankfully she already knew where Joe's bed was placed and did not have to look at the unlucky occupants of these rooms. 

“Are you Cameron? He's been asking for you,” a nurse appeared from behind the curtain by Joe's bed. 

“You're awake already?” The coder stood awkwardly, not sure if he would know she had been holding his hand all the way to the hospital.

“I told you,” Joe looked a lot more fly than anyone who just underwent abdominal surgery should look like, “it's nothing comparing to spending years in a hospital bed.”

“Are you alright?” Cameron marvelled.

“Are we doing the project?”

“We are.”

“In that case Mrs. Space Bike, I am very well,” he grinned.

Tbc


	3. Velouria

Chapter 3: Velouria 

John Bosworth looked around at the dusty floor, his gaze coming to rest at the hazard sign one of those delinquents working here must have stolen off some road works to haphazardly place in front of the rather large hole that still decorated the floor where Joe had fallen through. In normal circumstances, he would have long complained about it, remind those idiots what a normal, genuine workplace looked like, but then again he knew well enough that his breath would be wasted and besides, the feel of the place reminded him somewhere of Mutiny's early days where dozens of cables ran tangled into each other hazardously on the walls round young minds on fire who forgot about the most basic needs of ventilation and sunlight. He had tolerated that out of necessity, but he would have hardly done it for anyone else but the girl he had once regarded as his own daughter, the Katherine he had went to jail for, the brightest mind he had ever met and yet she could be so without insight and direction. And it was Cameron and only Cameron he had come back to work for once more, nothing heavy, just to utilise his connections and that of Diane's to get the gang's new project off the ground. 

He headed for the phone this time as well, swinging the door of the office open, “Jesus, Mary, Joseph and Christ! For a moment there, I thought I've sauntered into any random room at Cardiff!” John grumbled, shaking his head at the commotion occurring on the floor, comprising of Cameron and Joe grabbing random clothing items to cover themselves, “well, don't stop on my account,” the older man edged for the telephone, holding a hand up in front of his face to make sure he did not see anything he did not want to see, under any circumstances, “cord's long enough, I'll just grab this,” the businessman closed the door behind him and settled by the wall on the other side, as far as the length of the cord let him. 

“Do you think we've traumatised him?” Cameron joked, in a good mood, only seeing the positive side of everything for the moment. 

“Back at Cardiff? Sure. Now, not so much.” Joe gave his estimation, giving up on pulling his pants on in a hurry as it hurt his stitches. “He said not to stop on his account,” he put a hand mischievously on Cameron's thigh.

“I don't know Joe. He's right out there, it's kind of wrong.”

“And when did that stop you before?” The other ex-CEO teased. 

“I was reckless back then.”

“And now you're not?” Joe raised playful eyebrows. 

“Back then I didn't respect him how I do now, like a father. In any case, didn't the doctors say you should take it easy,” she drew fingers down his scarred chest, those beloved marks she loved caressing so much. Then she reached the newest addition. “It looks a bit red. You feel okay?”

Despite wanting to appear all right, Joe winced at her touch and let himself back onto the ground, atop the jacket they've been using to lie on. “You've been so worried about me,” he observed, somewhat disbelieving.

Cameron gave him a melancholic smile in view of all their history. It had been so foolish of her to imagine them not belonging together, they were as close to completing each other as it went. But then again, there were lessons that had to be learnt along the way, for both of them, making them wiser and allowing them to see clearer. “Seeing you get hurt, I hate it.”

Joe turned serious as well. They could hide behind the idea of satisfying their passions for a while, or falling into old habits, but the truth was that, “I'm in love with you,” he opened his soul, risking to be crushed, a film of moisture filling his eyes with the genuineness of it.

“I know that,” Cameron hung her head, clamming up at the admission. Saying it back, automatically as she had been doing with Tom felt wrong. And there was that tragic history behind them where they have caused each other pain. She wanted it to be able to mean something before she said it back, “I don't deserve that though. You, Tom, Bos, I don't know if I am who you all want or imagine me to be. I was never even supposed to be good with people, just numbers.”

“I know who you are,” Joe assured softly, quietly, but with the certainty of a force of nature. 

“You know the most,” the woman agreed. “But this is you and I, remember, destruction central.”

“Not anymore,” her lover established with a certain sadness. It wasn't just that they were older, it was the painfulness of the lessons along the way.

“Are you willing to bet on that?”

“I have no doubts about the world wide web.”

“It's the two of us I mean, and you know it,” Cameron contemplated. They had been so genuine, open and truthful with each other since the first moment they met again in Vegas, an inevitable and fateful consequence of all that's happened between and to them. It just simply could not be any other way. 

Joe pulled her closer, not minding how the weight of her atop of him was mildly hurting his still healing wound. “The alternative..I don't want to think about that.” It was unusual for them to kiss this gently, take so much time with savouring every touch, brush, movement and resulting sensation, fingers entangling in the other's, but this wasn't about wild passion, giving into instincts or a play of domination. Even her bite of his lips was playful, gentle. Then despite her inhibitions about spending too much time in private with Bosworth at the other side of the door, she slid to the side a bit and nestled herself against her partner, hand encircling his chest half possessively, half leisurely. The sense of calm was overwhelming. She was where she belonged.

The End.


End file.
